


Quite Probably (Dead)

by Marzi



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-23
Updated: 2012-07-23
Packaged: 2017-11-10 13:17:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/466722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marzi/pseuds/Marzi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The adventures of undead!Laura and her brain craving horde.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Quite Probably Dead

**Author's Note:**

> This first segment was written in response to prompt 7. Any - Any - People slaughtered and put in a mass grave come back to life. The next two spawned on their own.

Of all the different ways to exit the world, 'quickly' hadn't been on Laura's list of adjectives for quite a while.

Tom tugged at her arm, and she wasn't sure if he somehow meant to pull her to safety, an impossibility, or use her as a shield, which would be furtive.

The centurions lined up, raising their clawed hands, dangerous enough before they twisted into guns. As a spray of bullets was released into the crowd, and Laura felt several make their home in her chest, she seriously doubted that Elysium waited. In fact, as she tumbled forward, blood spilling out of her mouth as well as her wounds, she began to wonder where her faith had come from, as it had fled so easily.

When she opened her eyes to a star speckled sky, she felt like laughing, for if there were gods, they surely were too. Not that she was going to pay attention to those bastards anymore.

Laura struggled to sit up, hands still zip tied. She squinted in the gloom, wondering where her glasses had fallen to. Groping around in the dark by her knee, she found them, one frame was shattered, but she slipped them on regardless. Then what she thought was ground shifted underneath her, and she toppled over, rolling down a hill of what she realized were bodies.

Pushing herself back to her knees, she looked at the mass of stirring apparently-not-corpses. It seemed those who had been executed had simply been pushed off of the cliff if they hadn't fallen.

Executed.

Laura's hand jerked up to her chest, checking for bullets wounds. They came free with sticky, congealed blood. She started laughing then, but it had a wet, ill sound to it, and she hunched over as fragments of lung and drying blood were forced out of her mouth.

A hand started to pat her back, and she lifted her eyes, not all that surprised to see Tom standing next to her. He smiled, and she could see exposed skull through his tattered cheek. His shoulders and chest were riddled with bullet holes.

“Feel better?”

“Yes.” Her voice wasn't quite as raspy as she had thought it would be.

“Someone found a knife, c'mon,” he helped her stand, though she didn't feel like she needed it.

Walking, moving at all really, felt strange. As if her body wasn't really shifting, but because she expected it to, it simply complied. There had been no pain when she touched her wounds, no fire in her chest as its contents spilled out of her. Squinting in the dark, she noted that Tom's chin and lips were red too. She wondered how much he coughed up.

A line had formed by the man with the knife, and as Laura waited, she watched the other prisoners pick themselves up. Some were hunched over, coughing like she had been, more were shaking bits of entrails out of their shirts, and others were walking awkwardly in blood, viscera, and gods knew what else, soaked pants. Most of their faces were untouched, but in the crowd were a few like Tom; slivers of skin missing from their faces, muscle and bone showing through. Cartilage on one woman's smashed nose hung from her face.

When her wrists were cut free, she tested the skin with her fingers. The plastic had cut into skin on the right, and she could sink her finger into the crevice. She tugged her sleeve down over the wound.

Once everyone was freed they shambled over to the one body that hadn't stirred. Someone stepped forward and poked them with the toe of their boot. Their brain had been dashed open on the fall down, grey matter leaking from the crack in the side of his head.

“Anyone else hungry?”

A murmur went through the group at the comment, and Laura had to agree. She _was_ hungry.

“No, no.. I'm not going to be a monster,” a quavering voice proclaimed.

Laura stared in their general direction over the top of her cracked glasses. “The ones who put us here are monsters,” she countered.

Subdued agreement went through the crowd.

“Well I'm not going to stand here and think about eating some man's brains!”

That's what they were doing, wasn't it? Though really, Laura figured it was less thinking and more planning on her part. The guilty looks others were passing each other confirmed they were thinking the same thing.

“I'm not a monster, I'm not-”

There was a crack of broken bone and they toppled forward. Tom stared down at the body, large rock in hand.

“Anyone else not want to be a monster?” He asked the crowd.

No one else stepped forward.

“Thank you Mr. Zarek,” Laura said brusquely. “For demonstrating your keen diplomacy skills.”

A snicker arose from those assembled, and Tom dropped the rock with a shrug. “There's more for everyone, now.”

The laughter stopped. He had a point.

“Are we dead?” Someone asked.

“Probably,” Laura responded. “That never stopped the cylons, so why should it bother us?”

“But, we're human,” the same woman protested.

An awkward silence fell before she continued.

“Aren't we?”

“We're moving, and thinking,” she broke in. Thinking about eating brains, but what did that matter? “We can debate specifics later.” When she stomped away from the circle, she caught sight of Tom's amused look. “What?” She snapped.

“Oh nothing, great speech is all.”

“So,” a young man's voice carried over. “Can we eat them?”

All eyes had turned towards Laura.

She sighed. Why did she always have to be in charge?

“I don't see why not.”

Brain matter was surprisingly flavorful, and after Tom offered her one, she couldn't help but think that eyeball jelly really ought to have been a breakfast commodity before now.

When the skulls were hollowed out, quite quickly with the vast amount of people who had been executed by the cylons, the woman with the smashed nose spoke up.

“I'm still hungry.”

Laura stared at the horizon, knowing the walk to the city would be a long one. She almost sighed again.

_So much for dying quickly._

“Alright everyone,” she took the first step forward. “Let's get moving.”

Laura felt like a kindergarten teacher again, leading children through a park on a nature walk. It wasn't really all that different, she mused, after all, snack time waited for them at the end of this walk as well.

“I wonder what cylon tastes like,” an eager voice piped up from the back.

An argument broke out about whether or not cylon would taste better than human; and while she was distracted, Tom slipped his hand into hers.

Yes, it was exactly like kindergarten.


	2. Quite Probably Murderous

The sky had just started to lighten with the dawn when they reached the city. Laura let the shambling people pull ahead of her, eyes eagerly trained on the closest building. Tom let go of her hand to move ahead, determined to be where the action was.

The outpost they found was manned by cylons. The skinjobs shouted and screamed orders at their approach, but the centurions didn't seem able to recognize them as targets.

Being apparently dead had its perks, and once everyone realized the tall killing machines weren't about to gun them down (again); they descended upon the two Fives and a Three that were stationed there.

Wild bullets chased through the air into bodies that felt nothing. Fingers and bones that should not have been able to move with muscles and skin so unresponsive, simply curled into fists and claws; tearing down their enemies. There was power in their simplicity of thought and action. They tore the cylons to pieces because they had hands and pulled. Where their strength was from, where the familiar voices from their broken chests emanated, didn't matter.

There was just one important thing.

Brains.

The hungry horde around Laura seemed displeased with what they had, even though it was one greater than their last meal. One frustrated individual even took a gun from the security outpost and shot the centurions in the neck, destroying their processors and sending them crashing to the crowd.

The sight caused a cheer to go around the crowd, but they were quickly back to discussing the more important matter at hand: brains. Namely, procuring more than the three available.

Laura took off her bulky blue jacket, peeling off a slightly bloody, but fashionable, coat from the Three on the ground.

“Everyone,” she shouted over the cry of 'brains, where are the brains?'. “Those cylons have already downloaded, meaning more security is likely on it's way over.”

Silence fell immediately.

“We need to keep moving,” she continued. “So, anyone not willing to eat the cylons needs to start going now.”

Tom held up her new coat, and Laura nodded her thanks as she slipped it on.

A hand rose from the back of the crowd.

 _Children,_ she thought with an irritating fondness. “Yes?”

“If we don't want to eat the cylons, does that mean we get to eat the humans?”

Humans.

A tense current of possibility gripped them all. Were they now going to be defined as something other? Laura mulled it over. They seemed to have accepted her as leader, were at least following her at any rate, and whatever she said was likely to be taken to heart; or to whatever remained in their chests. Until they got too hungry. Should they murder their own kind? Were they _their own kind_?

She tapped her finger on her lip before noticing a greasy stain of fat from the last brain portion she had eaten, and quickly sucked the digit into her mouth.

A low murmur began to rise in the crowd at the expression on her face.

Damn, brains were tasty.

“I think,” she began, pulling her finger form her mouth and causing silence to fall again. “We should check to make sure these brains are just as good as the others.”

“A temporary solution at best,” Tom muttered from her side.

“I know,” she huffed. “It's a big step, splintering off from humanity. I think there should be time to think it over.”

“I don't think this crowd will want to spend a lot of time debating.”

Two people had stepped forward, easily splitting the Three's skull between them. Delicately, one popped out an eye, scooped a small smattering of brains on top of it, and handed it to Laura with a smile.

She took it, humming appreciatively. Her people knew her so well already.

Her people. They were already so different from those who dwelled within the city, and not just because they had been carted off to be killed.

Laura thought about taking a delicate nibble, but the treat smelled too good and she popped the whole squelchy morsel into her mouth in one go. The horde had their eyes locked on her as she chewed, moaning low at the taste. Someone in the crowd shuffled awkwardly and whimpered 'brains'.

She swallowed.

“Well?” Tom's voice was surprisingly breathy for someone who had coughed up their lungs onto the ground a few hours ago.

“Not bad,” Laura concluded. “Sort of a burnt, electrical after taste.”

Intrigued and hungry eyes peered down at the cylon bodies.

Another hand rose into the air.

“Yes?” She asked, running her tongue along her teeth, trying to catch more of the flavor from her quick treat. A thick, spongy segment of lung came free instead.

“Even if they taste good, what if we don't want to eat the cylons on principle?”

“It's good to have principles,” Tom piped up from her side.

She glowered at him. “Alright,” Laura spoke to the crowd. “If you don't want to eat cylons on principle,” she hesitated for a moment before concluding. “Then limit yourself to only eating the humans in NCP uniforms.”

This compromise seemed to please everyone, as most people had been pulled from their homes by such men and women to be executed.

“What if we don't want to eat humans, either?” Yet another voice persisted.

She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “What do you want to eat instead?”

“Dog.”

There were a few giggles and speculative murmurs from the horde.

“If you can find a dog,” Laura reasoned, “and feel inclined to eat dog, then eat the dog.” _Children_. She smiled, hands on her hips as she watched many move to enter the city. A small contingent stayed behind, scooping up cylon brains and debating the difference in taste to the human (mostly human?) brains they had earlier.

“So,” Tom stepped up to her side. “How are you inclined?” 

Laura's smiled curled into a wicked smirk, eyes straying to the ship yard in the distance. “I believe I incline towards President.” 

Tom chuckled. “Mind if I join you?” 

“Not at all.” She tucked her broken glasses into her new coat pocket, wondering how cylons got such fine clothing. Had they raided all the boutiques on Caprica after bombing the place? They didn't seem the type to sit and make their own clothes, which led Laura to the strange mental image of a centurion bent over a sewing machine. 

She stifled a giggle, but Tom was close enough to hear it anyway. He cocked his head to the side, silently asking what was so funny; causing the patch of torn skin to shift, revealing a different segment of his skull. 

Screams arose in the distance, drawing both their attentions. 

“We'd better hurry,” Tom sighed. “If we wait too long, he won't be nearly as surprised as he should be when he sees us.” 

“No,” Laura agreed. “He won't.” 

When he reached to take her hand, his fingers sank into the cut on her wrist instead. He quickly readjusted his grip so that his fingers were laced with hers, rather than her tendons. 

Laura thought about brains, Baltar's in particular, and pulled Tom forward into the blooming chaos. 


	3. Quite Probably Justified

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not big on warnings, they scream 'spoilers' to me, but I do understand the necessity of them. For the sake of that, I'll just say there's some potential squicky-ness ahead. As you've read far enough to read this, I say you probably won't be bothered.. this is zombie!crack after all.

Explosions dotted the alleyways, smoke blotted the sun and ash tumbled down to the sandy earth like snow. Walking down the main street, Tom at her side and screaming civilians running hither thither, Laura felt like a spectator at a particularly raucous Colonial Day parade.

“You know,” Tom kicked a corpse that littered the road. “We shouldn't leave all of these bodies here.”

“Once all the trouble settles down,” she reasoned, “I think everyone can assist in helping clean up.”

“Clean up?”

“If they're dead, they're not using their brain,” she concluded.

“I think their families might object, regardless.” His tone of voice implied he didn't particularly care about this fact.

“I don't think their families will be sticking around much longer.”

As it had turned out, much of the screaming when the horde had come into the city wasn't due to their appearance. Some kind of evacuation seemed to be in order, or uprising. With most people running rather than fighting, Laura figured it was an escape. A part of her couldn't help but huffily point out it was a bit late. There were perks to being mostly-likely-probably-dead though.

“Brains?” She offered Baltar's severed head to Tom.

They had found their president aboard _Colonial One_ , about to be killed by Gaeta. They'd asked him to direct his fire towards the man's chest, in order to keep most of his brains intact, but apparently the fact they were both still alive and been a little much for the young man to handle. Actually, no one in that room, even the Six, managed to take it very well.

“Thank you,” he pushed past some still attached vertebra and through the man's jaw to reach the fatty mess of gray mater. “What is in this?” Tom asked after slurping down some of the frontal lobe.

“I have no idea,” Laura's eyes moved across the sky, interested in the number of colors she was sure hadn't been there before.

“It's not bad.”

She hummed in agreement; not sure if the fireball dropping through the sky was real, or the product of the drugs Baltar had been on. It was strangely relieving to know she could still get high, and Laura wondered what else she could still do. She looked over at Tom, who smiled, the missing piece of his face contorting with the action.

“You know, he wasn't wearing an NCP uniform,” he stated before she could try something.

“He would have been found guilty of collaboration, and traitors get killed anyway.”

“That's questionable.”

She looked at him, doing her best to convey that him saying that was one of the most questionable sentences to pass through his lips. Instead of calling him on it, Laura settled on saying, “us being alive, that's questionable.”

“True enough.”

Deciding to act now rather than let Tom do it later, Laura dropped Baltar's head onto the ground and stepped towards her companion.

“What-”

She cut him off with her mouth on his, clutching his shoulders and closing her eyes. He responded as if her actions had been completely expected, and his hands quickly found her ass. Laura nipped at his lower lip, managing to take most of it off. It was a bit like tofu, when you really wanted steak- or in this case, brains. Tom's hands slid down to the tops of her thighs, picking her up and prompting her to wrap her legs around his waist. She pulled back from the kiss, tongue sweeping across her lips and smearing some of his blood across them in the process. He nuzzled his way down her neck, nipping her collarbone once he reached it, tearing the skin. Laura tugged at his hair to try and match the abuse, pulling some of it free.

Still curious as to one other possibility, she flexed her legs, hoping to bring their hips in closer contact.

“Well, that answers that question.”

He glowered at her statement, and her tongue make a cursory sweep of his eye. Tom quickly set about planting kisses and puncturing bites along her neck to move it from her reach.

“Tease,” Laura complained, dragging her nail down his neck and cutting into the skin.

“Glutton,” he responded, sucking congealed blood out of the wounds he had created.

“Hypocrite,” she retorted, tracing the tattered skin on his cheek as he started to gnaw her bra through her shirt.

“Harlot,” Tom panted, eyes now looking over her shoulder, hoping to find a wall to push her against. Wood paneling caught his eye and he stumbled towards it.

“Whore,” Laura moaned when he pressed her against the reinforced siding of one of the water tanks. She tore open his shirt, fingers examining the bullet wounds underneath before she brought them back up to lick the jelly-like congealed blood off.

“Up,” he insisted, nonsensically, to her ears.

“What?” She nibbled at the lobe of his ear.

“Up.”

Laura looked up, catching sight of the exposed crossbeam from the wall. She gripped onto it, pulling herself up, and Tom shifted her legs form his waist to his shoulders. Keeping one hand on the beam to maintain balance, she threaded the other back through his hair.

“Don't you dare-”

Tom sank his teeth into her thigh through her jeans.

Her protest quickly segued into a rising cacophony of yes's.

The hollowed eye-sockets in Baltar's severed head watched them from where it was abandoned in the middle of the road, completely forgotten.


End file.
